Christ's combination stores for me
Where I can he so well supplied,
Where I can one with brethren be
Where
competition is defied.

A
Sunday Visitor
to
the Sussex village of Northchapel might, on entering a little stone-built chapel
set back from the A283, hear a group of
elderly people singing this hymn
unaccompanied by any music. Not so long ago our visitor could have heard this and many other unfamiliar hymns in several chapels scattered across
West Sussex and Surrey. The worshippers were members of the
Society of Dependents, founded by John
Sirgood, and better known to outsiders as `Cokelers'. They were important for over a century in West Sussex
and Surrey, and
the hymn expresses a fundamental aspect of their faith and activity that made
them impossible for anyone in the district to ignore.

John Sirgood was born at
Averring, Gloucestershire, in 1821. During
the 1840s he settled at Kennington in south London, where he became a disciple of William Bridges, founder of the Plumstead Peculiars. Sirgood,
a shoe­maker by trade, preached widely around south London,
but in 1850 he travelled to Loxwood in Sussex
with his wife Harriet and soon
acquired a following amongst
farm-workers. This success was in an area with no tradition
of nonconformity, and to a degree Sirgood was perhaps filling a need that
the conventional noncon­formist sects had been unable to address. More important
perhaps, was his message. Nonconformity in Sussex was traditionally Calvinistic
and seems to have appealed more to small farmers and
tradespeople than to agricultural
workers.

'family group' of Dependents at Northchapel

Sirgood's emphasis on free will and his rejection of the system in
which Anglican clergy had spiritual and usually temporal authority
over their parishioners, may well have appealed to
farm-workers in a rigidly structured
class society, in which clergy were seen as aligned with the gentry and large
farmers. Whatever the validity of thus speculation, Sirgood was successful, and
eventually the Society of Dependents was formed, so-called because its members were
dependent on God for
everything. The nickname 'Cokeler' is of very early date, and is popularly attributed to
Sirgood's preference for cocoa
rather than beer.

This present-day parade
of shops in the Sussex
village of Northchapel
was formerly the Dependent
Stores, run
by a remarkable religious society. They lived communally 'over the
shop'. and their church immediately behind it can be seen at the
right ofthe picture.

Most aspects of Dependent belief are fairly orthodox within the
Arminian traditions of Protestant dissent. They believed firmly in the
people's ability to exercise free will and thereby achieve
salvation. Thus, in the nineteenth century, they were closer to Primitive Meth­odism
for example, than to Congregationalism Which was still strongly Calvinistic
in its belief in predestination.
Like Quakers though. Dependents were and are
avowed pacifists and were conscientious objectors during two world wars.

Misconceptions about their beliefs are widespread even in
published articles. Taboos against flowers in the home, ornaments, literature
other than the Bible, and photographs are commonly
listed, hut are not founded in the practice of
members of the sect.

Another misunderstanding comes from their preference
for celibacy, which once attracted great interest and
even hostility .
Contrary to popular belief, marriage has never been forbidden amongst
Dependents. Many have married and remained faithful to their church. But it is
true that celibacy has long been
preferred by most Dependents. Ben
Piper, an elder of the sect at Warnham until his death in 1948, recalled
in a handwritten memoir how his father in the
1870s began to believe `what a deal
more liberty and freedom himself and dear Mother would have for Christ's sake if they
remained as they were and not bring souls into the world, which if not born again is very sad'.

In Sussex, Sirgood attracted many followers amongst the
farm-workers and tradespeople in several areas. Meetings, and soon chapels,
were established at Loxwood,
Northchapel, Plaistow and Warnham in West Sussex: and Lord's Hill near
Shamley Green in Surrey: as well as later, at Chichester.
Hove and South Norwood
in London. There were also house-meetings as far away as Harden in Kent. By the time of Sirgood's
death in 1885, there were some 2,000
Dependents, although by 1904 only about 900 adherents remained. This
decline has continued until today; only a
handful of people now worship at the remaining church in Northchapel.

As happened to members of many nonconformist groups, early
Dependents were often sacked from their jobs, thrown out of their homes
and commonly subjected
to rough music. Disruption of their chapel services was also common for many years.
Whether it was in response to this persecution as well as
to the poverty of the farm­worker,
that the most distinctive aspect of their doctrine `combination' -developed, is unclear. By the late 1870s though, it was a
dominant part of their thought.

The former Dependent chapel at Loxwood, Sussex, as
it is today.

Dependents define
combination as `spiritual oneness'. Through
it the faithful might become members of a single body
the body of Christ. It was achieved through
prayer, scriptural awareness, and
frequent collective worship. Unfortunately
for early Dependents, work interfered
with worship, especially among women,
who were often in service and could not
easily attend the meetings.

To liberate women from the tyranny of service, shops were set up during the 1870s at Loxwood, Warnham,
Northchapel, Lord's
Hill, South Norwood, and perhaps elsewhere. By 1885 the Combination Stores at
Loxwood was a flourishing
enterprise with several departments and in 1920 there
was `a whole street of shops, with a large
garage and a great steam bakery'. The
stores at Northchapel, a village of
only 700 people, employed 13 saleswomen and assistants in 1904, besides the drivers of delivery carts. Virtually
anything was sold through the stores, which were so
successful that by the turn of the century they had prac­tically
cornered all trading activities in their respective villages. Most branches remained under
Dependent control until after the
Second World War, and the last to be sold was at Loxwood some 15
years ago.

Dependents pooled their meagre resources to set up the first
store, and they continued to invest what they could. Any member could become
a shareholder and large
dividends were reputed to be paid. Certainly the labourers who were Dependents
were considered to he much better off than those in
other denominations. What little wealth accrued to individuals remained in the movement
after their death, shares being bequeathed to
other brethren. Surviving Dependents acquired their shares in this way: as one
remarked to me, 'I never had any
money to buy any '. Members did not generally take their dividend, leaving it in the business to
accrue for the benefit of the
movement. Trade acquired a spiritual
significance,
but not trade for individual benefit.

But let
us to each other prone
All by each other-aiding,
'Tis love that do each brother move
Forall
to gain by trading.

During the
1880s. several farms were added to Dependent enterprises, the produce being sold in the stores, but the farms and stores did not themselves embody the idea of
combination. This was manifested in the way
they were worked and organised. Hired labour was seldom used. Dependents comprised the
work-force, and they
lived, as
some still do,
communally, with most
staff in each store or farm living under the same roof. Of the handful of survivors, a
number still live together under one roof in Northchapel
and Loxwood. In the late 1940s, some 16 men and women lived above the stores at
Northchapel, although two
decades earlier, there had been 26. Of course
some members, particularly married couples, lived separately from the rest, but
communal living provided the framework for most Dependents. Division of labour
was fairly conventional. Men did the usual male farm jobs and crafts, while women were the majority of shop assistants. Frequently
though, women held managerial positions in the stores. The able-bodied,
young, old and sick, all shared equally of
the fruits of
labour.

In 1917, the manageress of the grocery section of the Loxwood
stores. and resident there for over 50 years, described their lives. Meals
were taken communally,
men and women eating together. Brethren
received a small wage out of which they had only to buy
clothes, from the stores of course:
all else was found. Chapel services
were held on Tuesday and Thursday evenings from 7 until 9 o'clock; while on Sundays, services Were from 10.30am to 1pm: 2.30 to 4pm and 6 to
8pm. Dependents attended each of these services
whenever possible. Work was preceded and followed by private prayer and scriptural reading or pastoral work
filled the
evenings. Leisure was simple.

'We have a nice lawn where we
can relax from business
... We enjoy the peace and quietness and communion
with God. We also have a
boat and sometimes a nice
row on the river and enjoy the beauty of
nature the wonderfulcreation of God, sometimes a motor ride to the
sea where we again behold the majesty of God
is his beautiful handiwork.